It might have seemed like a battle the Knicks couldn’t win when they fell behind by 25 points Thursday night to the Celtics at Madison Square Garden. That, it turned out, wasn’t true as Evan Fournier’s 41 points, Julius Randle’s aggressive play and RJ Barrett’s last-second prayer pulled out the improbable comeback.
The much harder fight came late in the game and after, when Randle let his frustrations boil over and first signaling thumbs down to the fans who had turned from boos to cheers. And then after the game explaining his message to the hometown fans as, "Shut the [expletive] up.